LONDON — Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson faces
questions over his decision to slash London's fire
service while being the Mayor of London.

Johnson presided over the closure of 10 fire stations and
the removal of 27 fire engines, despite previously promising not
to remove them.

There are fears that many more tower blocks in London could
be vulnerable to the type of blaze seen at the Grenfell tower.

Johnson repeatedly denied he had any plans to cut fire
engines or fire stations, telling the London Assembly in 2010
that there were "no plans" to remove engines. Pressed on the
issue, he said in a filmed meeting that "I don't want to get
rid of them. What's the problem?"

When confronted by his opponents on the London Assembly about the
broken promise in 2013, Johnson told Labour's Andrew Dismore to
"get stuffed."

In 2015 questions were raised after a man jumped to his
death from a housing block in Camden after waiting for crews to
arrive.

One firefighter told the Camden
New Journal: "The first question we were all asking about
Camden was how long did it take to get there? The answer was more
than double the time we should have done. We are trained and we
are told that after five or six minutes a fire can become an
inferno."

He added: "Since the cutbacks, we have been stretched. It is not
unusual for machines [fire engines] to be coming from much, much
further afield – and we are constantly aware of that."

Current London mayor Sadiq Khan last year ordered
a review of fire service cuts across London, saying that he
could not be sure Londoners were safe.

"The key thing is this, are we safe as a consequence of the cuts
made by the previous regime?" he said on LBC.

"The short answer is I'm not sure. I'm starting to work to make
sure I can be reassured that we are safe."